Between Aksum, Constantinople, and Baghdad: Textual Practices in Late Antiquity

The production of texts, be they of a religious, philosophical or scientific nature, has been at the center of learned culture since antiquity. Such production goes hand-in-hand with an array of practices intended to guarantee the anchoring, preservation and interpretation of these texts within a certain canon of knowledge: text criticism, commenting, adaptation, translation, excerption, notation and illustration. Rather than assuming a static picture of "text traditions", the podium discussion aims to shed light on the impressive spectrum of activity associated with texts and their dynamics.